Five Things Make a Post: Sunny October Tuesday edition

1. Kay Kenyon offers her Top Ten Fiction Tips, and they're excellent, applicable no matter what sort of fiction you write.

2. The second Obama-McCain debate is tonight! I know where I'll be this evening.

3. I've been working on my own steampunky jewelry, but kajafoglio points out that Heterodyne Designs has got some gorgeous stuff for sale over on Etsy. I won't stop working on mine, but those pieces are awfully tasty. I wanna know where she's getting some of those gears!

4. This is austerity week at Chez scarlettina. I've balanced the checkbook, paid some bills, and am now working on ways to not spend cash, finding free fun where I can and budgeting for the pricier fun I want in the weeks ahead. I think I've got this week nailed. And you know what I love? I love having credit at bookstores, especially bookstores that sell new as well as used books. Yesterday, using bookstore credit, I picked up copies of David McCullough's "John Adams" and "All the President's Men." Yeah, I'm feeling presidential (but not running!). Wonder why. :-)

5. And a poll. because why not? [Poll #1274212]

ETA: I'm wearing my Halloween socks today, so I have happy feet. (I guess that's six things, isn't it? Ah well. Life is imperfect.)

Pre-debate thoughts

During the vice-presidential candidates' debate, I winced when Sarah Palin used the expression "Joe Six-Pack." I've seen this phrase in the press and I've never liked it. It's condescending. Today it's on the home page of The New York Times as part of a caption (possibly slightly ironically): "If all goes according to plan, Wal-Mart moms and Joe Six-Packs will drive the exchanges between Senators John McCain and Barack Obama at tonight’s debate." I understand that this expression, like Wal-mart Moms or Soccer Moms, is shorthand for the average American, but I hate what it says about what the candidates and the press apparently think of the average American. (I did read copperwise's excellent LJ post about who Joe Six-Pack really is these days and appreciated it.) But I still wonder is how these people could use such an expression and think they're accurately describing anyone or, more to the point, how they could think that anyone wants or is willing to be described in that way or will vote for someone who uses such an expression.

I'm looking forward to tonight's debate style, a town hall meeting in which the questions are brought by citizens. I imagine that this sort of debate is a little tougher to prep for, which makes me happy. I'm pretty sure it won't happen, but I want someone to ask McCain about the Keating Five scandal, to talk about how it reflects on his character, how it changed his senatorial behavior and what lessons it taught him about the economy. Yes, yes, I know: In my dreams.

In other news, the original Maverick family is pained by the McCain/Palin ticket using their name over and over and over again. They do not think it means what McCain and Palin think it means. A great piece on both history and etymology.

Post-debate thoughts

So, the second presidential candidates' debate is now history. McCain has sealed his image as cranky and condescending with his "That one" remark (and really, what was he thinking?), and Obama finally started hitting back hard, contrasting McCain's image of himself as a soft speaker by pointing out McCain's "Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" joke (which, to my ears, is no joke at all).

I'm glad that Obama stepped up to defend himself by correcting McCain's false accusations whenever time allowed, and to talk about specifics with regard to health care, foreign policy and the economy. McCain did, too, up to a point, but he sprinkled his remarks constantly with attacks and repeated lies (suggesting, for example, that Obama still refuses to acknowledge the success of the surge in Iraq when, in point of fact, Obama did that during the first debate to his very face). Obama even alluded, in a veiled fashion, to the Keating Five/S&L scandal by talking about lobbyists and deregulation, which made McCain's decrying of lobbyists later in the evening pretty ironic.

McCain talks about Obama being a spender, but McCain's the one who proposed $300 billion dollars in new spending on buying up bad mortgages. I bet Republicans love this idea. Aren't they the guys who think government should be smaller? Doesn't this sound vaguely Socialist to Republican ears? And isn't part of the bail-out package Congress and the President just signed into law intended to do this very thing? And where are all these billions of dollars going to come from, given that McCain says that he won't raise anyone's taxes? What it says to me is that McCain is planning to continue the financial policies of the current administration--which I think would be disastrous. Anyone who says that taxes won't go up is a liar, flat out, or has such an unrealistic view of our economy that they're too irresponsible to be president.

I'm watching "Hardball" right now, and Pat Buchanan just said that just by his regal bearing and presence, Barack Obama puts a lie to all the rough language that the McCain camp is spewing against him. That's remarkable.

I think I'll end my entry tonight on that note, because if Buchanan's got positive things to say about a Democratic candidate, the world must be coming to an end and I have some stuff to take care of before the lights go out.